Network Seven set to launch new high definition simulcast channel for its main channel
Network Seven appears set to follow rival Nine by launching a simulcast high definition channel for its main channel.
A new channel has appeared on electronic program guides at Channel 76 which currently features a holding slide with the Seven logo on it announcing a “new channel coming soon.”
The move comes just weeks after Nine announced it would convert multichannel Gem to standard definition and launch 9HD in time to coincide with the launch of the cricket season in November.
If it is a new high definition channel Seven would have to convert its current HD offering 7Mate to standard definition.
Tech website EFTM first spotted the move however Seven would not elaborate on the new channel with a spokesman telling Mumbrella: “Watch this space”.
Another possibility is the network could launch a new lifestyle style channel to rival Nine’s recent launch of NineLife.
Nine’s shift to 9HD has not been without problems with a number of consumers with older HD sets getting audio only due to the sets not being MPEG4 compatible.
Seven’s new channel is also to also likely to be MPEG4 meaning many consumers who want HD may be forced to upgrade.
February 7 update: Seven reveals new channel – 7flix
Nic Christensen
We need a movie channel
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We need a movie channel with old and new movie content
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In regards to sevens new up and coming channel 76 = WE do not need any more lifestyle or shopping channels! aarrgghhhh
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SBS should axe it’s low rating NITV channel and replace it with a World Movies channel. Last night NITV screened ‘Rabbit Proof Fence’ for the 12th time this year. They are stuck in a rut, regurgitating the same content to dwindling viewer numbers. What a waste of taxpayers money.
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I only hope the AFL will now be now broadcast in HD on free to air
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This hoolah ha about 9 & 7 ‘now’ being High Definition…how is this such a big trumpet blowing news….isn’t this something that should have happened 10 years back???
I thought I was a techni retard until I read this ..so called big announcement
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Hi, I hope it’s a STEAM MOP exclusive channel.
Enough of those Nutra Blender repeats interrupting my Steam Mop viewing.
Really people, enough is enough!
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b,
There was government legislation in place until recently that did not allow for the telecast of the main channel to be in HD.
This was changed back in late August or early September this year so that is why there is a big fuss about it, also the MPEG4 image is much clearer than the previosuly used MPEG2 encoding and it uses less bandwidth so it makes sense for the Networks to do so.
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In the next few years, look forward to seeing it all in 4K Ultra High Definition – the TV revolution has just begun.
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Australia needs a free to air 24/7 music channel. Not just nonstop chart play, but also music docos, films, tv shows etc. this would rival Foxtel’s channel v, mtv and more
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Thanks Brent, Make sense now
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Well done Seven if you are indeed going down the HD path. Hopefully in time for the tennis!
ABC has announced their transition for June next year. That leaves “we would love to show our programs in HD” Ten as the odd one out. And after all the disingenuous crap they went on with for not “being allowed” to broadcast in HD.
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The Australian Open tennis tournament in HD…
That would be awesome…!!!
“Come on !!!” Channel 7.
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what a pathertic bunch of losers..all these channels do is copy one another aus tv is bulklcrap i hope overseas stuff kills off anything aus because this country is so unoriginal just look at afl football rteally cant you think of another name to call your dumb sport..morning tv is same crap on 7 and 9 same moronic reporters telling same stupid news..heck HD they call HD but really its more like 720 pretending to be 1080..blame the gov that all channels arnt HD but hey we live in ther 70’s great advanced country you so call
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This household is over shopping channels , lifestyle channels and boring fishing shows and cooking shows what we need a movie channel a decent movie channel not watch a movie on normal 7 then two days later find it on another sister channel 7 like 72 or 73 lets see a proper movie channel to put Foxtel to shame , let’s go Australia proper TV Time , Free Tv , let’s make it the best in the world . because at the moment I’m bored I have over 2000 DVD’s and a membership to Netflix
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Can we please have a decent channel were programs are not repeated almost every second day,let’s have a channel for movies and classic Australian Soapies/movies such as The Paul hogan show,the Sullivan’s etc.There is too much overkill with home shopping products,oh wait I’m sure one more wont hurt – Hears a thought do a survey what we would like to see more of and see less of. I’m sure the majority are thinking along the same lines
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What difference does it make with movie channels, all the channels plays the same movies a hundred times. You want movies, join Netflix or Stan.
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I’m loving 9life ch94 & think this is s great move for ch9. We don’t need any more infomercial channels and I think an all day music and movie channel would be good. I don’t understand why we have Ch 7, 70 & 71 showing the same thing. Surely ch7 could look to expand their content & utilize these avenues more effectively.
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We lose channel 44 (and its brilliant Friday night horror show) to get what seems to be another infomercial channel…
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Get rid off “tv4me, Gold & Gold2 (win network) and the rest of the home shopping networks” we only need TVSN. give us a 24/7 Music channel and Movie channel. Give us Comedy, Ci! I see that New Zealand and London have WAYYY more tv channels and digital radio stations than Australia. Australia is so far behind it’s sad!
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A MOVIE CHANNEL WILL BE THE BEST MOVE EVER MADE IF YOU WANT TO BE THE TOP RATING CHANNEL I’LL BET MY SHIRT ON IT.
Denis Hart Mornington Vic
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I’m all for another HD channel of the main channel but not yet another boring lifestyle Channel. What about 7 network movies or 7 network drama or Australian old shows like a country practice or all saints? That would be far more interesting than yet another lifestyle and shopping channel.
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What we need is a station that have more things to watch like some of the old cartoon show and some new one too but in the afternoon kids gameshow and in the night movie and no more news and shopping station
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Yes we definitely need more Movies, how many time must we watch not only movies but the series type shows, i.e. Heartbeat, Morse et al.
are sponsors still advertising for us to watch repeat after repeat
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We definitely need upgrade free to air channels. Why do we need Netflix or foxtel? Australia tv should have music & movie channels they would rate highly & a channels with tv series (the waking dead, ray donovan, suits etc, remember shows with actors) not more reality shows.WE DON’T NEED any more llifestyle & home shopping channels.
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Seven West Media has also launched the 7Plus App for Apple TV iOS. I don’t have the new ATV but I have heard from those that do have them – Ads are in HD and programming is in SD. I am still unsure if they have the LIVE element to the app like the mobile devices……
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What’s the point of having an exclusive movie chanel. We would only get CONSTANT replays of Harry Potter, Star Wars, Bond movies etc. etc, etc…. WAKE UP we don’tt need to see repeat after repeat of the SAME crap
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We need TWO movie channels. One a classic movie channel of pre-1980 films, and the other 1980 and beyond. There must be some really cheap movie packages out there the networks could buy, particularly of classic movies. Many of them are public domain. It would be so great to see fresh content instead of the same old movies of the last ten years we get regurgitated week after week.
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I agree that we need a 24/7 music channel
how about RAGE as the music channel
and also it’s almost 2016 and i can’t believe that the channels aren’t all in HD
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and how about an Australian Drama tv channel , which could run shows like home and away , prisoner , neighbours , a country practice , hey hey it’s saturday , it’s a knock out
just to name a few 🙂
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Same CRAP just clearer…………
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And yes Stephen Hanson,imagine a channel showing old classics from the 80s,as u mentioned,prisoner,hey hey its saturday,a country practice and to add some more,different strokes,the a-team,six million dollar man,the hulk,kingswood country,showing those shows would surely get ratings because as a 44 yr old it would bring back memories and people who grew up in the 80s would love to see those shows again and i bet the younger gen would have a laugh but also get involved and to see what we watched in the 80s,because these were truely great,classic shows of their time.
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I agree with most of what everyone has said in the comment’s. I remember when channel go first started there was an aria music charts show on every night which I liked watching, I also loved the original channel one when it was just sport. Now you get family fued on all the channel 10 channels at once, non stop hours of back to back infomercials and as much repeats of the same films courtesy of channel 9 and its various channels. Australian TV really is poor and very far behind other countries. Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to watch the nutribullet infomercial again…
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What about a series of TV channels dedicated to specific decades? Channel 60’s, channel 70’s, channel 80’s and channel 90’s. And the return of the Sunday night movie.
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So many more channels, but so much LESS to watch. I thank my lucky stars that I have 480 free to air stations to watch via satellite, because there is absolutely NOTHING to watch on Australian FREE TO AIR television. That applies to Foxtel as well, REPEATS AD NAUSEUM. If this was the old days, i’d hand my television licence in, because of the SEVERE LACK of intelligent programming.
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P.S. The only stations on Australian free to air stations that I bother to watch are NITV and SBS and to a lesser extent the ABC. As for the commercial stations, I wouldn’t waste my electricity or time.!!
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Those that own large TV’s may be smiling, I am. 90 HD is a huge picture quality improvement over the pitiful resolution (576I) that we had on 9. If the other stations do the right thing and transmit real HD content then I and many others may be more enthusiastic and start watching again.
Home video recorders have been using the HD (1080 X 1920) resolution for ages and now you can pick up a UHD 4K unit for under $1000. So what is the excuse of the networks to the lack of real HD content? Government legislation? it may have stopped them from mirroring the primary channels but it didn’t force them to play crappy old black and white content with an 4:3 aspect ratio year after year. I’m pretty dammed sure that the very expensive studio and broadcast equipment has been HD or better compliant for many years, yet look at the crap they try to pass off.
While I’m having dummy spit there needs to one other change to commercial broadcasting practice in respect to content. Re runs of re runs that are padded out to double their original size with endless commercials. 10 mins of show 10 mins of commercials and then a 5 minute step back to recount… Everyone will know what shows I’m referring to. Was it not the case in the good old days that the ratio of adds to show time was regulated?
We started with a system that could have excelled and produced mutual benefit to the broadcasters and the viewers. But the failure of the governments to show any interest and the willingness of the broadcasters to sit on their hand has lead us to what I’m sure many of you consider rubbish.
We deserve betters than what we get.
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The biggest obstacle in having a 24-hr music channel is licensing fees. Rage is one of the most expensive programmes to run on the ABC. That’s why its broadcast with virtually no presenters – to keep costs down.
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We need a new free to air channel that shows old and new movies at the moment its all lifestyle channels it would be nice thankyou for reading this anyway
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I wish they had movie channels it seems the boys are catered for with sports but never any good movies.
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What we need is a channel that plays classic tv shows from the 1950s to the 1980s like they do in America .
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We would love to see Corronation Street, along with other ITV shows that were dropped from Channel 72 late in 2014.
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Most free to air channels are broadcasting rubbish. Repeating shows many times a year. If you look at the quality of shows they are either crap or aimed at an IQ level in single digit.
And that’s because tv channels don’t want to spend money on decent programs. Do yourself a favour and turn off the tv, save yourself money, and go spend some quality time out doors with family and friends.
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Movie channel
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We would like more crime drama and horror/classic movies (Like “It Came From Outer Space”, etc), but it will probably be just be adverts for steam mops, exercise machines and “reality” programming! It’s no wonder I watch ABC and SBS! We miss you TVS on 44!
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John, I find steam mop adverts a bit of a classic/horror……
The stations do show a lot of movies it’s that the structure and content seem a total mess.
Friday and Saturday nights is baby sitting night, all the movies are basically kids shows with the following shows being yet another late scheduled rerun.
Some of the old movies are pretty good and don’t need to be shown in HD so why not have a nostalgia movie channel?
As every one seems to have commented the stations need to cull off the data cast advertising channel’s. A new structure could include sport, movies old and movies new. 10 transmits two HD channels along with it’s others. I cant understand why they don’t have a viewer friendly programming. Are the station owner/ boards watching what they actually produce?
You cant please “all of the people all of the people all of the time” but with a little consideration you can certainly please a lot more for longer…..
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when is channel 76 starting
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NO MORE SHOPPING CHANNELS OR FOOD, COOKING NETWORKS SHOWS. WE ARE OVERLOADED WITH THESE. I VOTE FOR A MOVIE CHANNEL OR MUSIC CHANNEL
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Bring on a movie channel, or a channel for classic 80’s TV shows…
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Alas all the calls of the community fell on deaf ears. There is nothing like a bunch of suited executives making all the decisions for the public, after all, what does the average Jack and Jill know about media, TV, entertainment, or commercial investment.
Buy cheap and sell dear is the way to profits, people like cooking shows, so let’s give them cooking shows, cooking shows and cooking shows.
“Bread and Circuses” some Roman once said, and he was right. OK, we can’t give them bread, so we teach them how to make it for themselves on our extensive cooking shows, and circuses are out of date, so we bring them TV drama and comedy, well OK, they do cost a lot, so we give them HD and a host of cheap…sorry……varied local reality.
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PLEASE get rid of all the reallity crap,shopping and food channels, give us comedies movies family drama entertainment
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With 9Life screening million dollar listing episodes as old as 6 and 7 years (as a New Episode) its not wonder Free to air is losing its audience , who would bother watching it
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No more lifestyle, infomercial, or reality channels please. How about a movie channel?
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I live in a large country town and we still don’t get this new HD Lifestyle channel and the others and noone seems to know when we will.
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HD channels were part of the main readon for the original Digital TV plan, and were sidelined for lack of viewer support. People would prefer more channel choice than simmulcast channels. I’d rather have more content channels to cover major sports rvrnts such as the Tennis and the Olympic Games – The tennis has multiple courts in the earlier roundsm digital apps like 7Tennis provide extra choice – this needs to be provided for on FTA TV channels – and a new channel would suit this purpose well. And the olympics – we might be able to see more than the Pool and the Athletics, similar to the SBS coverage in a previous olympiad. Thats what additional channels are great for. I just think HD simmulcast is a waste of a channel
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